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War in Scandinavia
Background Shortly after the Invasion of Poland, the Soviet military command mobilized the Baltic Army, Fleet and Air Force, as expected by most military analysts. As the ports of Leningrad and Riga bustled, commanders of present divisions recieved orders to invade Scandinavia as soon as possible. The region was an instrumental part in hegemony of Europe, and the Allies were able to threaten Mother Russia from it, thanks to the proximity to Allied Finland. The armies were also supposed to capture military bases and other assets in Norway to attack Great Britain and other Allied forces in Europe from. The Allies were fully aware of this and told the Scandinavian governments to prepare for an imminent invasion. Young men from all the Nordic countries were called in to defend their homes, assisted by international soldiers from the Allies. The Allied strategists expected that the Soviets would concentrate at pushing through northern Finland to quickly reach the crucial Norwegian North Sea ports. The biggest cities would also be prioritized, according to pundits, as their capture would strike heavily at Allied morale. What the strategists didn't know was that the Soviets had expanded their navy in the Baltic massively, and commissioned a remarkably larger fleet than in the last war to lead an amphibious attack on Sweden, which coast was only protected by old coastal guns from the first World War. The Allied defense plan, code named "Igloo", was to rely on aircraft. The Allies had always had air superiority, and a large number of air units were stationed in Scandinavia, including the recently developed Swedish Apollo Fighter. Courtesy of promising Swedish company Angstrom Defense, it had recently won the bid for the Allied air superiority fighter. However, another well-concealed fact was the truth behind a new asset to the Soviet army, named the KDB-2 Bullfrog. While Allied recognition had spotted an "armed transport vehicle", no one had apparently paid close attention to the direction of the guns. The responsible spies later defended themselves, saying that "the ones we saw were clearly horizontal". "Clearly horizontal" has since become synonymous to "bullshit" in the lower ranks of Allied command. Although rumors of decoy Bullfrogs with anti-surface weaponry strengthen the agents' claims, the matter has since been resolved by not insatisfactory pensions and private apartments by Miami Beach. Force Composition Allied Forces Most of the ground forces were stationed in the Finnish forests to defend against the incoming onslaught. The Allies combined the Nordic National Armies consisting of mostly infantry, M5 Beagle Light Tanks and PzKpfw VI Mastiff Tanks, and international Allied brigades, including British MBT-X8 Guardian Tanks and some PzKpfw 44R Bulldog Tank Destroyers; as well as reinforcing the local armoured forces. The forces were deployed in Finland and Sweden. The larger concentrations of troop worth mentioning were by the Finnish-Soviet border, the major cities of Finland, and the vulnerable coastal capital of Stockholm. The majority of the naval forces were amphibious, their purpose to make Allied tactics more flexible, and allowing the Allies to fall back if needed to be assisted by the ground forces. The 2nd Allied Amphibious Squadron consisted mainly of FnACV-66D3 Riptides, and the new SwM-4e9 Crocodile hovertanks, a recently developed and therefore untested asset. The Allied naval presence was led by the ''Von Esling''-class Aircraft Carrier ANV Independence, the flagship of the Allied Navy in the Baltic. Escorting the Independence was a flotilla of ''Hispaniola''-class Hydrofoils and ''Michell''-class assault destroyers. Several other Assault Destroyers were also were deployed as part of the amphibious squadron. The Scandinavian Air Force was very strong compared to the Soviet equivalent. Squadrons of P-55 Hawkers were positioned in the Finnish and Swedish forests, valleys and in few cases even on the cliffs of the Scandinavian mountains. In Swedish air bases a large number of GIC-F Cutlass Ramjets was stationed, to gain speed long before they would meet any Soviet MiGs. The Swedish airforce was also equipped with several modern TB-1V Vindicator bombers and seven squadrons of new F-11 Apollo fighters, the latest VTOL aircraft, able to outgun the Soviet MiG-19E fighters. Angstrom Defense, the creator of the Apollo fighter, was ordered to relocate development to Scotland, due to the vulnerability of Stockholm, to ensure continued development. However, most of the air forces had been reorganized and modernized in the months preceding the war, and so most of the aircraft lacked both pilots and fuel; therefore, the Allies were extra vulnerable, which was one of the reasons for the Soviets to attack. Soviet Forces The Soviet ground force assigned to "Operation Moose Hunt", as the invasion of Scandinavia was called, consisted of four divisions; the 2nd, 3rd and 4th Infantry divisions, based in Leningrad, and the 11th, called in from Arkhangelsk. The 4th and 11th divisions were ordered to move towards the Finnish border to attack, while the 2nd, and 3rd divisions were to stay in Leningrad for the time being. 8,500 soldiers were supported by 400 KDB-5 Sickles and also 1,700 KDB-2 Bullfrogs, for transport and to counter the strong Allied air force. The 2nd, 5th, 9th, and 10th tank divisions, consisting of 1,700 T-58 Rhino Tanks and T-64 Hammer Tanks, joined the Infantry Divisions in the assault on Finland. Already outnumbering the Allies on land, the 14th Heavy Tank Regiment, made up of 12 JS-3 Terminator Tanks and a number of smaller vehicles, was mostly supposed to decimate Allied morale and to add insult to injury by crushing any opposition in is path rolling through Scandinavia. While traditionally the Allies had controlled the Baltic Sea, the Soviets had spent a huge sum of money on improving its Baltic Navy. Both its quality and quantity had skyrocketed. The assault force was led by the ''Dreadnought''-class Battlecruiser CCCP Irkutsk, recently renovated in the Soviet naval expansion. The fleet also included a total of 320 other ships; including several ''Akula''-class submarines, numerous ''Stingray''-class Tesla Boats, the ''Potemkin''-class battleships CCCP Gradenko and CCCP Kirponos, and 150 KDB-2 Bullfrogs for fleet air defence if the ones assigned to the infantry divisions proved insufficient for whatever reason. In contrast to the massive naval force, the Soviet air power in the Baltic area was deliberately limited; the Bullfrogs would take care of the enemy aircraft anyway, and there was enough land power to make any air investment redundant. Therefore, the Soviet Air Force could concentrate on Central Europe, where the Soviets needed them more as the fight was expected to take longer. The aerial presence in the area consisted of only two units; the 32nd Fighter Regiment, consisting of 200 MiG-19E Fighters, and the 56th Bomber Regiment, with 100 Tu-24 Badger Bombers. Both squadrons were based out Leningrad, due to its proximity to Scandinavia. The Fight for the North The 24th of April 1965 was a sunny and bright spring day, ideal circumstances for an invasion. At 4 AM, on the signal of a red signal flare lighting the Karelian sky, Soviet soldiers therefore crossed the Finnish border and began firing at Finnish border guards. Meanwhile, the Soviet Baltic Fleet left its port and sailed westwards, aiming to establish hegemony over the Baltic Sea. An awake Finnish sergeant, whose name has been lost to history, called the chief of operations, who in turn woke up the Finnish President, alerting the Allied officials. The Heads of State and Government in the Nordic countries were evicted to Oslo, where a ship awaited to take them to Great Britain. Sirens alerted the citizens, who grabbed their valuable properties and prepared for the incoming Soviet assault. The Allies were soon on the retreat in Finland, overwhelmed by the invading force. While the Finnish soldiers were experts on winter warfare, the mild weather didn't help them, and they couldn't match the Soviet quality and quantity. The Soviets did however lose many men on their way into Finland, as many of the Soviet conscripts were inferiorally skilled to the well-trained Allied soldiers. The Soviet dominance of the Baltic also began, with the capture of the unusually lightly garrisoned island of Gotland, strategiclly positioned in the middle of the sea. The island wasn't equipped for military operations, however, and so the Soviets wouldn't have much use of it except for camping trips by the limestone rocks. The Allied fleet left its docks and headed for the open sea, to engage its Soviet counterpart. However, the amphibious forces were no match for the Soviet naval improvements; the Allied ships were soundly decimated, especially the new SwM-4e9 Crocodile Hovertanks; in addition to its thin armour, its construction made it prone to falling apart onto itself, making it collapse. An Allied member of the crew forwarded a message to Neptune Hovercraft, creator of the Crocodile, which is reported to have consisted of only swear words; although its contents have been classified by the Allies. Meanwhile, the army in Finland lost battle after battle, as the Soviet armour rolled through the scenic forest landscape towards the Gulf of Bothnia, quite a few conscripts stopping for icy baths in the Finnish lakes. Without reinforcements, there was no hope for the Allied soldiers, and therefore they were ordered to fall back to the coast, surrendering Helsinki which had been besieged for three days. The Allied air force was almost ready to enter the battle, and would relieve the land combattants. During this, a large part of the Soviet transport vehicles returned to land, assumed to pick up soldiers for opening a new flank by the Finnish coast; a fact which was only partly true. The Battle of Stockholm As the victorious soldiers of the Soviet army marched west, the Allies directed their navy towards the Finnish coast to intercept the troops and relieve the unprotected coastal cities. While the navy was effective in slowing down the offensive, this was because the Soviet fleet didn't pursue it. It instead turned towards another target; Stockholm, the largest city in Scandinavia. The Allies had assumed that the eventual invasion of Stockholm would wait until the Åland islands were captured, so the Soviets could flank the city from all directions. Instead, the strike came before even capturing Turku. The three bombardment ships in the Soviet Baltic Fleet, ''Potemkin''-class Battleships CCCP Kirponos and CCCP Gradenko and ''Dreadnought''-class Battleship CCCP Irkutsk started bombing the Stockholm archipelago, quickly taking out the worn down coastal guns protecting the city from an enemy invasion. Meanwhile, 4000 soldiers were launched from KDB-2 Bullfrogs able to sneak past the Allied fleet on its way to Finland, onto the suburbs of Haninge and Nynäshamn south of Stockholm. The Allies had concentrated their defenses in the north, close to the Åland islands, where the invasion was "supposed" to have taken place. The result was that the Soviets were effectively unopposed in the south, and able to reach the southern suburbs of Stockholm just a few hours after landing. The startled Allied Amphibious Force detached a hundred FnACV-66D3 Riptides and 3 ''Michell''-class Assault Destroyers to counter the attack. On its way to Stockholm, they ran into a convoy of Soviet civilian transports. The leader of the provisional division, the young coast guard soldier Bert Karlsson, ordered an attack on the convoy, against Allied conventions. Although most of the division were sunk by the convoy guards, they managed to sink most if not all of the convoy. While the incident has been classified by Allied officials, and the hothead captain court-martialed and cryo-imprisoned, wide spread rumours in Sweden connect the convoy sinking with the disappearance of a large part of the 14th Heavy Tank Regiment. The rumor has been denied by the Soviets, who condemned the Allied attack on an "unarmed food supply convoy". With the counterforce decimated, there was little left to resist the Soviet march on Stockholm. Civilians were asked to not resist the invaders and to remain in the bombing shelters; the leaders sought to minimize civilian casualties and preserve the city. While a few citizens refused to comply, and were soundly defeated by the enemy invaders, most of them obeyed or left the city. Thus, the Soviets marched over the bridges onto Södermalm, the workers' district and the southernmost part of the city center, on virtually empty streets. 24 hours after the first coastal artillery piece in the Stockholm archipelago was destroyed, the Soviet banner was raised on the castle of Stockholm, signaling that the city was in enemy hands. Only a few dozen Swedish citizens had been killed, almost everyone of them resisting the invasion. However, now the soldiers posted in the north of Stockholm, where an attack had been expected, had reached the city limits. The Battle of Stockholm was about to truly begin. The Allied forces in the Stockholm area, numbering 30,000 men and 100 tanks, were facing only 4000 Soviet Soldiers, and the Allies thus expected to be able to route the Soviets easily and recapture Stockholm. The Soviets couldn't match the Allied numbers in Sweden, even if reinforcements would come. The Allies approached the fields of Djurgården, where the Soviet squadrons had set up camp for the night. What the Allied scout troop that had been sent out saw was drunk Conscripts sitting around campfires, telling stories and drinking vodka. Therefore, they decided that an imminent sneak attack to take out the invasion force quickly was of importance, and returned to plan the strike. But when the scouts returned to report to the rest of the soldiers, half of them fell down dead, killed by a single bullet. Seconds later the other half were killed. In secret, the Soviets had called in the famed sniper Natasha Volkova to assist their soldiers while the Allied navy was split between Sweden and Finland, along with another 4000 soldiers and 800 KDB-2 Bullfrogs who attacked the Allied troops. The Allied tanks were either destroyed by Badger Bombers or left without a driver thanks to Natasha. At dawn, the Allies were scattered and rests of Beagle Tanks and Mastiff Tanks littered the field. The Soviets hunted down most of the surviving troops in the nearby forests. With little resistance remaining, Stockholm was effectively secured. Raining Steel After the surrender of Stockholm, the Scandinavian command panicked. Allied expectations were to be able to route the Soviets when the forces met, and now the Allies had lostr decisively and the southern parts of Sweden were virtually unprotected. Therefore, an emergency meeting decided that the Air Force should be sent in prematurely. While not all planes were ready to strike, the Allies desperately needed fire support from above, and so 250 planes flew from various air bases in Sweden and Norway to crush the Soviets in Stockholm and the Baltic Fleet, which the Allies still thought lacked any anti-air measures - but oh how wrong they were. Because in the Soviet attack plan, there was no room for open flanks like that. Instead, what the Allies had thought to be a new Soviet man-cannon transport, was not only that but an effective anti-air measure; and the Baltic was literally full of them. The Soviets weren't just prepared, they were waiting for the air assault so the pride of the Allies could be taken down. Fighters and bombers soared over all of Sweden, as the might of the Allied Air Force was on its way east. However, when the TB-1V Vindicator Bombers were getting ready to destroy the Soviet detachment in Stockholm, they were met by fire from below. Completely unprepared, the air force went into anarchy as scared pilots attempted to return to base, often instead crashing into another aircraft. Those who took the other routes to the Baltic were met by the same welcoming committee by the Soviet ships, and plane after plane crashed into the sea. The terrified crew on the Allied fleet watched as their rescue fell down from the sky, and the navy decided to leave Finland to its destiny and retreat to port in Copenhagen. A Futile Resistance The Allied army was on the retreat in Finland, barely holding out in the coastal cities, and almost eviscerated in Sweden. The navy was retreating and the air force almost evaporated. The Soviets now outnumbered the Allies in every front, and Allied commanders called the situation "bloody hopeless". Four days after the capture of Stockholm, the Soviet forces in northern Finland crossed the Finnish-Swedish border and entered the border town of Haparanda, which surrendered after a quick skirmish between a few hunters and the Red Army. Soon after, all of Finland was completely in Soviet hands, and the forces in Sweden were routing the remains of the Allied soldiers. The Reds marched through Uppsala and Västerås on the 6th of May. While the Soviet officers cheered in their offices, their Allied counterparts began to discuss retreating troops to Norway, where there was more chance for the soldiers to resist their enemies. Nothing was left to turn the tide now; the theatre was essentially lost. Soviet tank divisions were transported freely across the Baltic Sea, now that the threat of interception had diminished. The invaders steamrolled through the Swedish forests and plains towards Gothenburg, Malmö and Oslo. The forces arriving from Finland and entering Swedish Lapland aimed at the important Norwegian supply port Narvik. Natasha Volkova followed the 2nd Infantry Division towards Malmö and Denmark, eliminating any resisting Swedish soldiers and civilians, but disappeared halfways. She appeared next in Germany. The Allied strategy in Scandinavia had changed from "Defeat the invaders" to "Save as many civilians as possible". Ships left the free ports of Sweden and Norway daily for Western Europe, mostly to Iceland where temporary homes were established for refugees from Scandinavia. Resistance was becoming increasingly limited. Gothenburg surrendered on the 12th of May and Malmö one day later, after a heavy battle against the resistance which damaged the city center heavily. Now the Soviets prepared for crossing the Norwegian mountains, to ensure complete domination over Northern Europe. Deep Seas and High Mountains The mountains of Norway were to prove a tougher opponent for the Soviets than expected. The Norwegians, not as threatened by destruction as the Swedes and Finns living by fields and forests, conducted a not insignificant guerilla warfare. Assisted by Swedes and Finns who had fled west to regroup and the tattered remnants of the Allied army, they slowed down the Soviet expansion considerably. The Soviets were also not optimally equipped for mountain warfare, and the tanks could simply not pass through some of the mountain passes. The relatively easily accessed capital of Oslo was reached on the 17th of May, the Norwegian Constitutional Day parade replaced by one of Soviets. Many Norwegians cried as the National Day ended with the Norwegian banner replaced by the Soviet flag, and the resistance almost doubled after this disgrace of the Norwegian nation. Bergen, Narvik and Trondheim were all seized shortly afterwards. The Soviets now began mopping up the Norwegian resistance, but to little avail. While the detailed information of the incident is strictly classified, it is known that a group of Soviet soldiers got lost somewhere in the mountains of northernmost Norway, and stumbled upon a Cryo Prison Facility. The Cryo Legionnaires stationed to guard the prison initiated the highest-level countermeasure in order to protect the prison, where many Soviet spies and other important prisoners where held. All over Northern Norway and even parts of Sweden, hidden cryo bombs detonated, encasing the lands in ice. Only the Cryo Prison itself was spared, leaving every Soviet soldier in the area frozen solid. However, this didn't prevent the rest of the country from falling into Soviet hands by the end of May, as the guerilla activities diminished but remained; the resistance simply ran out of bullets. In Denmark, a massive military base was quickly constructed in Copenhagen, to keep the Soviets from invading Denmark and gaining another pathway to the European mainland. The Baltic fleet had docked in the Copenhagen port, and a large amount of Multigunner Turrets and Spectrum Towers were constructed. How much the Soviets ever wanted to, "Fortress Copenhagen" as many locals started calling it, was essentially impenetrable. However, the Soviet occupied Sweden was equally unreachable; defenses were quickly set up in Scania, and attempts by the Allied Fleet to land were fruitless. In a remarkable attack, all but one of the remaining SwM-4e9 Crocodile Hovertanks were lost, half of them due to Soviet fire and the other half due to self-collapse. This caused the Allies to cease production of the inefficient vehicle, and the eventual bankrupcy of Neptune Hovercraft, its manufactorer. Two days after the failed attack, on the 31st of May, the Allies officially ceased military operations concerning "the retaking of control over the Scandinavian mainland". The War in Scandinavia was over. Aftermath Like in Poland, the Scandinavians were treated well, although many Norwegian would forever loathe the Soviets for the "Nasjonalydmykelse", the National Humiliation. Those who didn't resist could live their lives almost as before, except for the introduction of Communist economy. Allied Field Marshal Robert Bingham is credited to have said that "at least we won't have to free spaces in the cemetaries for civilians". The Soviets even partly repaired the destruction of the Malmö city center and compensated for the lost property. The lenient occupation has easened the post-war recovery of the Scandinavian nations. In Norway, the artificial ice cover wouldn't melt until the end of the war was coming close. The soldiers who discovered the facility were captured and frozen to preserve its classified location, and those frozen by the bombs returned to Russia for psychological treatment, most of them turning insane. The Cryo Legionnaires increased the patrol to avoid detection, but the Soviets would not find the well-hidden prison again. The Legionnaires remained at the prison facility, as protecting the dangerous prisoners was a higher priority than trying to reclaim a country, which was far beyond their capabilities. The Soviets took over the still usable Allied bases in Norway, which were used for harassing military and supply convoys in the western Baltic Sea, and targeting troops in Denmark, Scotland and northwestern Germany, with moderate success. While doing their best to acquire Allied technology, the blueprints to most technical advantages that were produced in Scandinavia had been taken away by the Allies beforehand. The Soviets did however create an experimental portable phone from Finnish technology, which could only be used to talk with another person less than 100 meters away. The project was scrapped before it could enter the Soviet electronic stores. Instead, the big consequence of the invasion was the Soviet domination of Northern Europe, which would continue until the very end of the war. Category:Battles